


Songs That Nobody Wrote

by lesbianophelia



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Divergence, F/M, I Don't Even Know, Minor Character Deaths, minor character deaths everywhere, this is sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-06
Updated: 2014-09-06
Packaged: 2018-02-16 08:03:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2262096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbianophelia/pseuds/lesbianophelia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a different thought that puts the berries in District Twelve's Star Crossed Lover's hands, and the price they pay for following their mentor's instructions is dire. Alternate Games. Inspired by "Forest" by Twenty One Pilots.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Songs That Nobody Wrote

**Author's Note:**

> A) this fic is sad and I won't be offended if you don't read it. (Everlark HEA...ish? Can be implied?) 
> 
>  
> 
> B) here are some of the lyrics that inspired this fic. 
> 
> "Quickly moving towards the storm, moving forward, torn  
> Into pieces over reasons of what these storms are for  
> I don't understand why everything I adore  
> Takes a different form when I squint my eyes  
> Have you ever done that? When you squint your eyes  
> And your eyelashes make it look a little not right  
> And then when just the right light comes from just the right side  
> And you find you're not who you're supposed to be?  
> This is not what you're supposed to see  
> Please, remember me I am supposed to be  
> King of a kingdom, I'm swinging on a swing, some-  
> Thing happened in my imagination  
> And the situation is becoming dire  
> My tree house is on fire  
> And for some reason I smell gas on my hands  
> This is not what I had planned  
> This is not what I had planned
> 
> Down in the forest, we'll sing a chorus  
> One that everybody knows  
> Hands held higher, we'll be on fire  
> Singing songs that nobody wrote."
> 
> From Forest by Twenty One Pilots, as is the title.

“We both know they have to have their Victor,” Peeta says, and though she knows what the plan is – what the plan has been, since before they even entered the arena, she actually thinks that he believes what he’s saying when he tells her that one of them should be the one to make it out. That he loves her. 

It’s a carefully executed move when she takes the berries out. That night when they laid in the same bed before the games, he had whispered it in her ear. Had said that maybe, if it came down to the two of them, they could find a way to make it out. And she saw the look in his eyes when she told him that the nightlock berries were poisonous. Saw the almost imperceptible nod he gave her when she said that maybe Cato would like berries, too. 

… 

Her hand keeps a tight grip on his during the final interview – not because Haymitch had tried to warn them that what they had done was stupid and that the Capitol was angry, but because she honestly feels like she might float away if she doesn’t have Peeta to steady herself with. 

“Being without Katniss … it’s unthinkable,” he says when Caesar asks them what was going through their mind when they pulled the berries out. “The thought of only one of us coming out of the games – it was so unfair.” 

 

She knows that he’s said the wrong thing, but she doesn’t realize the depth of it until they get back to District Twelve and the bakery – and Peeta’s family – is gone. Burned down to the ground in a way that no one believes was an accident, even if they won’t say it. 

… 

She spends the night in his house, in his room and his bed, after about a month and a half. She had thought, once, that her nightmares were bad, but they seem like nothing compared to the ghosts that plague her district partner. She holds him against her chest and lets him sob, and he chokes out something like sometimes I don’t understand why we did it but she doesn’t have an answer for him. 

What she does have is a house with her mother and her sister, and he doesn’t want to move in at first, but she wears him down once he’s already spending his time there for dinner and breakfast and lunch. Her mother tries to protest about Katniss and her boyfriend sharing a room, but a look is enough to silence her. 

Whatever Peeta is, boyfriend isn’t the right word for it. They haven’t been physical at all since the kisses after the games, even though she’s not exactly opposed to them. She’ll get them soon enough, on the Victory Tour. 

… 

A few days before the tour, a peacekeeper comes to inform them that Katniss’ family will have to stay in their old house in the Seam while Katniss isn’t in her dwelling. She tries to protest, but Prim says that it’s all right. That she’ll be back soon enough. 

She whispers her fears to Peeta. Says that she’s afraid that she’ll lose them if they don’t convince the president not to kill them. He kisses the top of her head, pulls her a little closer, and whispers that they’ll have to make sure that they don’t fail, then. 

… 

Haymitch was the one that gave Peeta the idea for the stunt with the berries, she learns when they get out of the train when it stops to refuel. And she hits her mentor across the face, perfectly manicured nails leaving three perfect scratch marks on his cheek. 

Peeta pulls her off of him, saying that he was just trying to help in an attempt to be reassuring, and she whirls around on him. “Who was he trying to help, Peeta?” she hisses. 

“He got us both out of there,” Peeta returns hollowly. “Wasn’t that the point?” 

One look at him tells her that he would have preferred it if only one of them made it out. She holds onto him a little tighter for the rest of the day, and that night, she hopes that the words she whispers are enough to assure him that she wouldn’t have been able to make it this far if he wasn’t there with her. 

… 

They get engaged, but it isn’t enough. There is a fire in the Seam the night before the train pulls into the station. Her hand slips out of Peeta’s when she realizes that the roped off section for his family isn’t the only one that’s empty. But he covers for her. Throws his arm around her shoulder and presses kisses into the side of her face, silently begging her to wait until she gets back to the Victor’s Village to break down. 

And break down she does. For days, she doesn’t even let Peeta into her – their – room. When she finally does, she curls into a ball on the side, and tenses up somehow further when he tries to comfort her. She hasn’t even left the Victor’s Village by the time the announcement for the Quarter Quell comes. In a way, that’s what brings her back to life. 

If you could call it that. The training and eating that she and Peeta spend all of their time on. Haymitch promises to volunteer for Peeta if his name is the one that gets called, but informs her that there’s nothing he can do if Peeta volunteers in his place. She knows that. But that doesn’t make the fact that Peeta is the only thing that she has left to lose any easier. 

… 

Somehow, she doesn’t lose him. Instead, they’re thrust into a different district. A different arena. One that’s seen them as the faces of their rebellion long before they officially accepted the role. 

"Peeta, do you think we’re supposed to trust these people?" she asks one night, lips pressed against his ear, as has been their tradition for nearly two years, now. 

He’s quiet for so long that she doesn’t think she’s going to get an answer. “I don’t know. But I think the fact that we have to ask is the reason we’re victors, Katniss.”  
\- fin -


End file.
